This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press December 25, 1996.July 2
Los Angeles County officials say they can't afford to staff the courthouse Palmdale offered to build. The news throws a wrench into the city's plans to build a small civil courthouse next to City Hall to boost downtown improvement efforts and to spare people involved in lawsuits from driving out of the Antelope Valley for trials.
SACRAMENTO - Thank the "three-strikes" law for a 25-year low in the California crime rate, Attorney General Dan Lungren says. The state's 1995 crime rate - the number of violent or serious property crimes per 100,000 residents - dipped to 2,808, the lowest it's been since 1970.
July 3
LOS ANGELES - Lockheed Martin Corp. gets the contract, but California turned out to be the big winner in the race to build the next generation of U.S. spacecraft. The $900 million X-33 project will bring 1,000 new jobs to a region hit hard by defense and aerospace cutbacks early in the decade.
It also preserves about 200 jobs at Rockwell International Corp.'s Rocketdyne unit, which will build the engines for the prototype vehicle.
PASADENA - Vice President Al Gore personally delivers the good news: Palmdale-based Lockheed Martin Skunk Works wins the $941 million X-33 contract.
July 4
EDWARDS AFB - A $30 million launch facility will be built here for Lockheed Martin's scale model of the next-generation space shuttle. The facility, which will generate about 100 new jobs and take 16 months to complete, is planned for an area south of the base's new B-2 facilities.
PALMDALE - The Planning Commission deals a blow to Antelope Valley College's plans to build a new campus in Palmdale, voting 3-2 to deny a conditional use permit for the proposed College Park project.
July 5
EDWARDS AFB - A singleengine, 28% scale model of a lighter, stealthier, tailless aircraft arrives at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center for tests. Two remotely piloted McDonnell Douglas aircraft are expected to demonstrate that tailless fighters work and that they can achieve greater agility than other fighters.
PALMDALE - The Los Angeles Department of Airports cancels plans to dump L.A. City sewer sludge on a large portion of Palmdale Regional Airport land. The Department of Airports had been considering leasing up to 4,000 acres of the Palmdale airport to a company called Stanford Research and Development Co.
July 6
PALMDALE - A narrowly outvoted bond measure intended to build and improve schools in the Palmdale School District won't be back on the ballot in November, but may go before voters in March.
July 7
PALMDALE - Foreclosure proceedings against the masterplanned Ritter Ranch community are continuing as developers and city officials try to negotiate an agreement that will allow construction to resume.
July 9
LANCASTER - City Councilwoman Deborah Shelton violated no provisions of state law when she failed to report a $5,000 loan to her husband's business in the fall of 1994, the Fair Political Practices Commission concludes.
PALMDALE - The city's new roller-hockey rinks and Farmers Market open this weekend as centerpieces of a celebration kicking off the city's Downtown Revitalization Plan.
July 10
LANCASTER - Three alleged skinheads who reportedly attacked two teenagers as they were taking a late-night walk here Monday are captured by Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies.
LANCASTER - A Thai exchange student living in Lancaster through an international Rotary Club program testifies she never gave guest host Tom Shelton permission to use her $1,500 in traveler's checks. Shelton is the husband of Lancaster Councilwoman Deborah Shelton.
July 11
PALMDALE - Rockwell North American Aircraft will keep its share of B-1B bomber maintenance and modification work here, Air Force officials indicate. Five more aircraft will come to Palmdale's Air Force Plant 42 in 1997, and the Air Force will retain an option to send another five bombers here in 1998, says Rockwell's B-1B vice president and project manager.
LANCASTER - Tom Shelton, a city councilwoman's husband on trial for allegedly embezzling $1,500 from an exchange student who lived with the Shelton family last year, testifies that he believed the money was a loan.
July 12
LANCASTER - Felony assault and hate-crime charges are filed against two boys allegedly involved in a racially motivated attack on two black teens.
LANCASTER - A mistrial is declared in the case against Tom Shelton when a jury deadlocks 10-2 in favor of convicting the husband of Lancaster City Councilwoman Deborah Shelton on charges of embezzling $1,500 from an exchange student.
July 13
LANCASTER - Formation of a volunteer-driven task force to monitor reports of hate crimes and assist victims is unanimously approved by the City Council.
PALMDALE - Property owners win a partial victory when the Palmdale City Council reduces proposed increases in landscape maintenance taxes.
July 14
LOS ANGELES - A man arrested but not charged in the attack on two black teenagers is beaten to unconsciousness in jail, Los Angeles Sheriff's deputies report.
July 16
LANCASTER - Hoping to halt a wave of hate crimes that began with a skinhead attack on two African American cousins last week and continued with three separate black-on-white assaults Saturday, authorities beef up their patrols of the Antelope Valley.
LANCASTER - Palmdale Mayor Jim Ledford says his city is willing to help operate a toll-free hotline for tracking hate crimes throughout the Antelope Valley. However, his council is not convinced that the tracking should be left to the Antelope Valley Hate Crimes Task Force, a body sanctioned by the Lancaster council.
July 17
LOS ANGELES - District Attorney Gil Garcetti angrily defends his staff's role and timing in the Hi Vista land fraud case during a grilling from the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, saying his office moved carefully to avoid jeopardizing civil actions.
VAN NUYS - After a day and a half of deliberation, a jury finds Lancaster resident Raymond Beltran Jr. - who claimed that a 1994 shooting was in retaliation for being raped by his victim - guilty of first-degree murder.
July 18
LITTLEROCK - A Littlerock High School music teacher is arrested on suspicion of molesting one of his students, a 16-year-old girl. Band instructor Richard Michael Perales, 57, is arraigned on three counts and released on his own recognizance until a hearing Aug. 20.
July 19
PALMDALE - An anti-hatecrime rally is canceled due to lack of participation, but that doesn't stop a high-ranking official representing Louis Farrakhan's controversial Nation of Islam from threatening the Antelope Valley with harsh repercussions if certain demands aren't met.
NOI officials meet in a closeddoor session with Palmdale Mayor Jim Ledford.
With smiles radiating happiness, new parents Diane and Rob Rowe take the first of their quadruplets home from Antelope Valley Hospital. The Valley's first quadruplets have been hospitalized in the AVH Neonatal Intensive Care Unit since their slightly premature birth the night of June 24.
July 20
LANCASTER - Silence will not end the spate of hate crimes in the Antelope Valley, Pastor David Parker says. That's why he and other members of the AV Christian Ministerial Association will hold a rally at Lancaster City Hall to show their opposition to such activities.
LANCASTER - Allegations about official wrongdoing that have dogged City Hall for the past two years appear to have come primarily from one person: a former city employee who fed information to two council members.
The unproven allegations, ranging from complaints about ethical improprieties to law violation, are addressed in hundreds of pages of transcripts from legal depositions generated by former assistant civil engineer David Korczyk's lawsuit against the city.
July 21
LANCASTER - The Antelope Valley Union High School District will reopen in September with nearly a doubled security force at all its schools.
Superintendent Robert Girolamo says that, at least for the first 10 days of school, the district will add four security guards to its normal force of seven at each school.
LANCASTER - The bird is back.
The head and feet of the costume for KaBoom, the large, purple mascot for the Lancaster JetHawks baseball team, is back on the field, a happy ending to the bird-napping that lasted nearly a week.
A man on his way to work found the missing parts along Bouquet Canyon Road, and called authorities.
July 23
SYLMAR - Two teenage skinheads plead not guilty Monday to felony assault and hate-crime charges stemming from an attack on two black Lancaster residents.
LANCASTER - At least 400 voices rise in unison to sing "Lean on Me" at a rally in the courtyard of City Hall.
The rally was, in the words of one 16-year-old resident, "a real good start" toward ending racebased crimes in the Antelope Valley.
July 24
ROSAMOND - A 3,000-plusacre brush fire - the largest this year in the Antelope Valley - burns out of control for several hours, forcing the evacuation of many homes in a sparsely populated area six miles north of Rosamond Boulevard and 170th Street West.
LOS ANGELES - County planning commissioners deny a conditional use permit to Biogro Systems Inc. for a planned 67-acre composting plant at 145th Street West and Avenue A.
July 25
MOJAVE - McDonnell Douglas and Tracor officials meet in Mojave to explain how Tracor's $30 million contract figures in the MD-95 airliner's development.
For the Antelope Valley, the contract means 100 new jobs for at least nine years for experienced aircraft toolers and assemblers, says Don Sullivan, Tracor Flight Systems vice president and general manager.
PALMDALE - Negotiations to forestall foreclosure proceedings on the 11,000-acre Ritter Ranch master-planned community have not progressed in the 30 days since notices of default were served.
ROSAMOND - More than 400 firefighters from several different agencies work around the clock to put out the largest brush fire this year in the Antelope Valley.
The cause of the fire that burns4,800 acres north of Rosamond Boulevard and 170th Street West is still under investigation.
July 26
PALMDALE - The maker of the world's first stealth fighter is one of two companies working on a model of a radar-evading missile.
Lockheed Martin Skunk Works' F-117 now is an Air Force staple, and company officials hope the first stealth missile prototypes also will come from Palmdale design boards and hangars.
Skunk Works employees will produce nine radar-evading missiles as part of a $110.9 million contract awarded to Lockheed Martin Electronics and Missiles of Orlando, Fla.
All four of the Antelope Valley's first quadruplets are home at last, healthy and happy.
July 27
ROSAMOND - The Kern County Board of Supervisors will consider adopting a new policy to keep minors from accessing pornographic material available on the Internet at county libraries.
July 28
Three developers decide now is the time to make their move in the Antelope Valley real estate market. Together, they are opening three new tracts this weekend with high hopes of being the leaders of the next Antelope Valley real estate boom.
Despite a space shortage and funding uncertainties, many local school district officials think they can take part in the state's plan to shrink class size to 20 students in kindergarten through third grade.
July 30
BORON - A Minnesota mechanic is killed when a tire he was removing from a loader parked at the U.S. Borax plant suddenly exploded.
ANTELOPE ACRES - A suspected methamphetamine lab explodes in sweltering 103° heat, sparking a fire that consumes three mobile homes, 3 acres of brush and a barn and forcing evacuation of one household.
July 31
LANCASTER - With the support of the federal government, a San Diego-based property management company will open a computer practice and job-training center for its low-income tenants in the Antelope Valley.